Across the Internet, within organizations, and in other areas, users increasingly rely on networked servers to provide access to information. Because of the volume of information that must be stored and monitored, users typically will access multiple servers to find and retrieve a document. For example, in an Internet search, a user will be directed to one or more servers to search indices that may help identify relevant documents. Once the documents have been identified, the user will follow a link to one or more other servers to retrieve the document.
Users similarly may access multiple servers within an organizational network to retrieve documents or other information within businesses, universities, government entities, and other organizations. Because of the massive numbers of documents and other types of data that may be stored in such networks, users may access one or more servers to identify the information they seek, and access other servers to retrieve the documents and information sought.
In both types of contexts, it is desirable to reduce the demand placed on the individual servers in processing queries for documents. In addition, it is desirable to reduce the network communications traffic involved in executing the search to identify relevant documents and other data.